


The Weight of What You Give

by elisela



Series: No Sincerer Love [4]
Category: 9-1-1 (TV)
Genre: Chris and his Idiot Dads, Christopher Diaz is a National Treasure, Domestic Fluff, Established Relationship, Idiots in Love, M/M, Tooth-Rotting Fluff, no beta we die like men
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-23
Updated: 2020-04-23
Packaged: 2021-03-02 01:13:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,387
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23796688
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/elisela/pseuds/elisela
Summary: Eddie Diaz is a lucky man, and he reminds himself of that every day.
Relationships: Evan "Buck" Buckley/Eddie Diaz
Series: No Sincerer Love [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1714489
Comments: 29
Kudos: 632





	The Weight of What You Give

**Author's Note:**

> An outtake from [No Sincerer Love](https://archiveofourown.org/works/23651578) for [Chris Diaz is a National Treasure](https://chrisdiazweek.tumblr.com) week. Day 3: Eddie and Chris ... uh. I tried. But Buck kept sneaking in.

Eddie Diaz is a lucky man, and he reminds himself of that every day.

The sun warms his feet as he digs his toes in the grass; face tipped up and a glass of lemonade, courtesy of Christopher, sweating in his hand. His boys have dinner going in the kitchen—Buck’s been on a cooking kick, lately—and they’d relocated to the backyard for some exercise while it cooked. They hadn’t invited Eddie but he’d followed, choosing to lounge in the hammock instead of tossing the medicine ball back and forth. 

This is one of the times that it’s almost too difficult to watch Buck with his son, one of the times that his heart makes him feel like he’s drowning, like the weight of everything Buck gives them is too much for him to handle. The medicine balls are new, brought home that afternoon because Buck had read a study showing improvements in dexterity in kids with cerebral palsy who performed certain exercises. 

Apparently, Buck gets studies emailed to him.

Eddie hadn’t even known that was a thing you could do.

He allows himself to drift off to the sound of his family’s laughter, secure in the knowledge that Chris is being looked after, that everything is right with his world. It amazes him sometimes, that he gets to have this sense of contentment, that finally, there is nothing about his life that he would even dream about changing. That he is _happy_.

Buck kisses him as he goes back inside to check on dinner and a moment later, Chris drops onto his lap. “Dad,” he says, “can we get ice cream later?”

Eddie wraps an arm around Chris’ waist, pulls him close. “Anything you want, mijo,” he says. 

There’s a pause, and Chris adds, “Just you and me.”

Eddie frowns. He and Buck make sure to do plenty of things with Chris on their own, cognizant of the fact that Chris needs one on one time with each of them. But Chris has never _asked_ for it, has never suggested excluding Buck, and it makes him wonder if he’s not doing enough for his kid. Is Chris missing him, somehow, in between all the time he’s spending with Buck lately? It’s true that they’ve been busier than normal; Buck’s mission to teach Chris how to cook has taken over their lives simply because Buck never does anything by halves. Their coffee table is covered in cooking magazines with dog-eared pages, the pantry full of things like orange blossom water, garam masala, and other ingredients he doesn’t think he could name if he tried. He hopes not. 

“Just you and me, kid,” he confirms. He’ll get his answers later.

It doesn’t take Christopher long to divulge the reason he didn’t want Buck along. Eddie’s two bites into their shared banana split when Chris reaches out for his hand and says, “Dad, why don’t you want to marry Buck?”

Eddie very carefully does not choke, but if he needs a drink of water before he answers, that knowledge is for him and him alone. “What makes you think I don’t want to marry Buck?”

Chris stares at him and says, very slowly, like he’s talking to someone who has only very recently learned English, “Because you haven’t asked him to marry you.”

Eddie tries not to laugh. “Is this something you’re worried about?”

He watches as Chris takes a giant scoop of whipped cream. A bit of it ends up on his nose, and Eddie resists the urge to wipe it away and instead pulls out his phone. Chris smiles wide for the picture, then looks at Eddie seriously and says, “You know, Buck won’t wait forever.”

It’s probably a good thing he hadn’t taken a drink of water when he wanted it. “He won’t? News to me.”

“Dad,” Chris groans. “We _need_ to ask Buck to marry you.” He gives Eddie the puppy eyes—ones he’s gotten far too good at under Buck’s direction. 

Eddie lets him suffer for a bit while he eats more ice cream. The truth is, he’d considered asking Buck before—back when they first started officially dating, which according to everyone else was about a year after they actually started dating. And though it felt right, Eddie had hesitated. He’s been working on leaving the past in the past, and he does a pretty good job of it most of the time. All his decisions—however selfish, however wrong—led him to this place in his life, and it was a long struggle to accept that it was okay to be happy. But there is still a part of him that cautions him to slow down when he starts thinking about marriage. It’s nothing to do with Buck, because Eddie certainly intends to spend the rest of his life with him, and everything to do with the part of his brain that tells him that he ruined one marriage, and he cannot allow himself to mess up another. 

“Buck and I will get married when Buck and I want to get married,” he says eventually.

“Buck wants to marry you,” Christopher says immediately.

“Hmm, giving away Buck’s secrets?” he teases. “Not sure he’d like that.”

Chris makes a face at him. “Like it’s a secret.” Eddie has to agree; he knows, without a doubt, that Buck would say yes. There’s no secret about the way Buck feels for him, for Chris. “I just want you to get married and be happy,” Chris says.

“We’re happy, mijo,” Eddie says. He scoops up the cherry that’s fallen onto his side of the bowl and holds it out to his son, swerving his spoon at the last second to dot a drop of ice cream on Chris’ nose. “I promise, Buck and I are happy.”

Eddie’s never had so much fun in a kitchen. He’s caught between Christopher’s childlike glee at being able to really help for once, to do something other than open boxes and occasionally mix things at the table, and Buck’s quiet look of pride as he watches them. Eddie loves this time with his family, he holds as close to his heart as he had when he was a child, helping Abuela spread soft masa over corn husks in a house filled with love and laughter. 

He’s been feeling like this more and more often lately, this jumble of quiet contentment and noisy joy filling his body with a peace he has so desperately craved over the years. He doesn’t think he’ll ever be able to put into words how grateful he is that Buck has so freely given this to his child, that Christopher will remember this warmth and affection long past the time he grows old, that he will forever hold the memory of someone who loved him with everything they had. 

Eddie will never forget that Buck has no obligations to his son, but has made the choice to love him anyway; the choice to nurture him, the choice to spend his time doing everything he can to make Christopher’s life better, to ensure he has what he needs, the choice to always and unfailingly put Christopher first. 

The way Buck loves overwhelms him, but he wouldn’t have it any other way. He doesn’t want it any other way; he could happily stay like this, in this moment, until the end of time. 

“Hey,” he says, leaning his head in and resting it against Buck’s. He feels Buck’s affection so acutely that it makes his hands shake. “I want this forever.” Buck makes a quiet, happy noise in his throat, but it’s not an _answer_ , it’s not what Eddie wants to hear, so he nudges at him a little.

“Me too,” Buck says quietly. He tilts his head in Eddie’s direction, so close that Eddie’s breath is taken away by the unguarded look of happiness in his eyes.

“Buck,” he says, just to be sure, “I’m asking you to marry me.”

Distantly, he hears Christopher’s marker hit the ground, his sharp intake of breath, but then Buck says, “Eddie, I’m saying yes,” and his world is narrowed down to the feeling of Buck’s breath on his lips and fingers in his hair.

Eddie Diaz is a lucky man, and he will remind himself of that every day.

**Author's Note:**

> [prompt me on tumblr](https://hearteyesforbuck.tumblr.com/ask) or follow [hearteyesforbuck](https://hearteyesforbuck.tumblr.com/)


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